Lesbian teacher fired after being outed

Students and supporters are rallying around a gay teacher recently fired from her job at a Catholic school, reportedly after local Catholic officials learned about her sexual orientation. Carla Hale, a longtime teacher at Bishop Watterson High School in Columbus, Ohio, was fired after her partner’s name, Julie, was listed among the survivors in a public obituary for Hale’s mother. The obituary ran in the Columbus Dispatch on Feb. 25.

A petition on Change.org calling for Hale to to be reinstated read: “Carla Hale, a beloved teacher at Bishop Watterson High School, was fired because of her sexuality. She was a teacher who cared for her students and treated each one with respect. The school, however, did not reciprocate that respect in its treatment of her. Discrimination and injustice is something that we all have a duty to fight in today’s society. It’s unfair that someone who cared so much about her students and her job should lose them on the basis of something she cannot even control.”